These days, almost everyone has a smartphone, tablet, or another mobile device. Plus, the internet is now the most used communication, entertainment, and business platform, making digital marketing necessary for all businesses.
With over 60% of online searches now coming from mobile devices, mobile website traffic has become more critical than desktop traffic. As such, to be successful in today’s highly competitive digital marketplace, you need to adopt a responsive web design.

What is a Responsive Website?

A responsive website allows your website design to adapt to the size of the user’s screen. So, visitors could be viewing your site on any device without noticing any significant differences in your site’s general appearance.

The Importance of Responsive Web Design

You want your end-user to have a superior customer experience when they visit your website, regardless of the device they’re using. Below are some of the benefits of choosing a responsive website design.

Improved User Experience

Whether a visitor is viewing your website on a desktop, tablet, mobile phone, or laptop, a responsive design will ensure an outstanding experience and increase customer reach on all devices.

Search Engine Rankings

Search engines use plenty of information to rank websites, but they consider mobile-friendly design one critical factor. And where your company appears in search rankings can affect your business’s visibility and success.

Easier Management

Instead of building separate websites for mobile devices and desktops, a responsive design makes things easier to manage and cost-effective. For instance, site managers can complete all updates at once rather than update several sites separately.

Competitive Edge

Responsive web design allows you to create exceptional customer experiences and gives you a competitive advantage over your competitors—especially if they don’t have a mobile-friendly website.

Responsive Web Design – What is it & Why you need it

Elements of a great website design include high-quality content writing,  responsive design, engaging images, layouts, and many more. A responsive design should automatically adjust without requiring custom-made solutions for each device or screen size. However, responsive design is more than automatically resizable images and adjustable screen resolutions. Here are some ways to make a responsive design website:

• Fluid Grid: sizes the elements of your site proportionally, making it easy for your web design elements to respond to the screen’s size
• Flexible Text & Images: adjust within a website’s layout automatically
• Media Queries: allow for multiple layouts of a web design that uses the same coded webpage
• User Testing: whatever form it takes, getting feedback from users is priceless (but some sites will charge a small fee)
• The Browser and Device Testing: make sure the layout is compatible with as many physical devices and browsers as possible
• Pre-Designed Layouts: all you’ll have to do is update the content, branding, and colors to match your needs—if you need expert help, contact us at Digital Engage.

The Future of Responsive Design for Mobile

Search engines, as well as devices, are changing by the day. Mobile phones are getting larger, and foldable smart devices are starting to gain traction. While Google’s algorithm regarding responsive design doesn’t affect tablets just yet, it’s crucial to stay ahead of the curve and aim for a website structure that can accommodate whatever devices the future holds.

Is My Website Ready for Mobile?

Making your website mobile-friendly is necessary and part of the SEO strategy, as Google already uses mobile-friendliness as a search engine ranking signal and punishes websites that aren’t optimized for mobile. Google drives 96% of mobile search traffic, so having a mobile-friendly website increases visitors to your site. Ultimately, it affects your site traffic, conversions, and overall success.

Responsive Design Best Practices

There is no cookie-cutter approach to designing a mobile-friendly website. However, there are a few tips that will help to make your website more appealing to end-users. Here are a few things to bear in mind:

• Optimize for speed
• Use a responsive web design framework
• Test and improve your site
• Simplify interactions and navigation

Digital Engage is a digital marketing and web design company based in Tennessee. Our professional team has expertise in services like website design and development, wordpress web design, WooCommerce, shopify web design, wix services and others. You should choose us because we provide professional consultation, value our clients, have a track record of success, and are always available to provide you with the most professional services. Call us today to learn more about our services.

According to an estimate in a 2017 Review Trackers’ study, more than 35% of all search traffic is local. That said, optimizing your site for local SEO is the key to driving users to your site. This is a crucial marketing strategy, especially for smaller regional businesses or companies that want to drive traffic to multiple locations.

Optimizing for local SEO helps you compete more effectively against established brands that have been in the industry for ages. Here are eight simple steps on how to improve local SEO for your business.

Optimize for Google My Business

Google My Business is one of the best tools for getting your business in front of local customers searching for your products and services. By creating a Google My Business account and filling your listing, your local business will appear on Google Search local results, Google Maps, and Google Search Knowledge Panel. This makes it easy for customers to find your address, business hours, photos, and other information.

Optimize Website Content for Local Keywords

You want to optimize your website for keywords that are relevant to your local customers. Once you’ve done keyword research and have a list of local keywords you’d like to target, infuse them into your web content, headers, meta descriptions, title tags, and other SEO elements to boost visibility.
If you’re not sure which keywords to target, we at Digital Engage understand the ins and outs of keyword research. We’ll help you target the right keywords to improve your local SEO.

Optimize Your Website for Mobile

Closely connected to the practical importance of local SEO is the rising use of mobile devices. Your local customer could be in the neighborhood and using their smartphone to look for a company like yours. Paying particular attention to mobile-friendly web design, for example, improves your local search rankings.

Create Local Content

Creating local content is a great way to grab a local customer’s attention. Consider setting up location-specific webpages or writing blog posts about local events and activities. Creating local content can help you gain authority for areas you’re targeting. For example, if you own a car dealership in Miami, you can write an article with maintenance tips or other location-specific advice for car owners in Miami.

Optimize for Voice Search

Thanks to the prevalence of voice assistants such as Siri and Alexa, voice search is gaining popularity. Businesses need to leverage this and optimize their content into more conversational tones. The trick is to make information readily available as more people will be seeking answers or solutions to a problem when using voice search.

Get High-Quality Relevant Links

High-quality, relevant links from other websites provide ample opportunities to boost your local SEO. They factor in Google’s local ranking algorithm because they indicate your legitimacy and authority in a particular field. An excellent first step is to get your business listed in online directories.

Leveraging your offline relationships is also another way to go. For example, you can talk to other businesses or partnerships about linking to your website. Publishing high-quality content is also beneficial, as others will want to link to your website.

Get Regular Reviews from Happy Customers

Online reviews are essential in today’s world of stars and ratings. According to various studies, many people value positive third-party opinions as much as personal recommendations. Be sure to encourage your customers to leave positive reviews.

Use Location Pages

If you’re serving customers in different locations, leverage location pages by optimizing them to target those specific areas. Include details specific to each location, such as photos, individualized descriptions, contact information, etc. on each of the respective pages. This will ensure that local search results are relevant to local customers.

The Importance of Local SEO

Some ways to improve your local SEO include optimizing your website for local keywords, building citations, getting reviews, using local directories to list your business, and many more. Following the tips mentioned above will help increase your business’s visibility to local customers and your bottom line. However, optimizing your web presence for local searches can be challenging, especially without technical expertise. Not to mention, you never know when Google will update your algorithm, so it’s crucial to stay up to date on the most recent developments.

Digital Engage is a digital marketing and web design company based in Tennessee. Our professional team has expertise in services like website design and development Drupal Development Services, Joomla Services, Hubspot, Prestashop and others. You should choose us because we provide professional consultation, value our clients, have a track record of success, and are always available to provide you with the most professional services. Call us today to learn more about our services.

If you are struggling to convert traffic into sales online, you might have a problem with your bounce rate. In other words, people that are visiting your website are simply bouncing away. Fortunately, there are ways to improve your site, lower your bounce rate, and boost sales.

What Is Bounce Rate?

Bounce rate refers to the percentage of visitors to your website that leaves before viewing a second page. A high bounce rate can be indicative of many things. Maybe your site didn’t have a persuasive call to action. Perhaps users were unable to find what they needed in a timely and efficient manner.

You can find your bounce rate using Google Analytics. Content that is “good” or “bad” depends on your type of site and your company goals. For instance, a search engine, like Google or Bing, typically has a bounce rate under 30 percent, which is considered excellent.

However, simple landing pages with single calls to action like “add to cart” have bounce rates ranging from 70 to 90 percent. This range is considered substandard. The rule of thumb says that service, retail, and portal sites will have lower bounce rates compared to simple landing pages and content websites.

There is no one sweeping fix to reduce the bounce rate. The figure may be a result of one glaring issue or a combination of several problems. Here are ten practical ways to troubleshoot for high bounce rates.

·        Provide a Better User Experience

A user’s personal experience with your website can go a long way towards whether or they purchase your product or service. That is why it is essential to not only have a site that is intuitive to use, but aesthetically pleasing as well. A robust website should feature compelling visuals, easy readability, and a distinctive tone and color scheme.

·        Reposition Your Call to Action

A compelling call to action should clearly and explicitly lay out what the purpose of the company, product, or service is. Users should be able to understand everything they need from this simple phrase.

·        Tell Your Brand Story

Telling a compelling brand story can capture the hearts and minds of your target audience. Bring your brand to life with an exciting origin story or engaging mission statement. If you can attract people this way, you will be more likely to develop a loyal following.

·        A/B Test Your Site

A/B testing allows you to test two versions of your webpage against one another to determine which one is more effective. This strategy is not only crucial for the landing page, but also can be applied to help you better target specific audiences, regions, and keywords. For instance, if your product is sold across the world, you can use A/B testing to show them content that matches their language and cultural experience.

·        Keep Your Content Fresh

Regularly populating your pages with engaging content is imperative, especially if you produce art, videos, photos, or blogs. Businesses that updated their blogs periodically see 126 percent more leads than competitors that do not. Fresh content is also a chance to excite visitors about your call to action, upcoming announcements, or new products.

·        Use SEO

The question of how effective SEO is can be understood by knowing the importance of the keywords. Search engine optimization, or SEO, uses specially selected keywords to target specific audiences. Choosing effective keywords will increase the likelihood of visitors connecting with your brand message and clicking through your website. Great SEO is a self-fulfilling cycle, as the keywords will lead to more clicks, boosting your site on search engines, generating even more clicks, etc.

·        Use Videos to Get Eyeballs

Video is the ideal way to get someone’s attention in a hurry. The visual experience is designed to deliver your message quickly while demonstrating what your company is all about. Videos are always a tremendous opportunity to entertain the audience and give them a taste of your company’s personality.

·        Use High-Quality Images to Grab Attention

The human brain processes images 60,000 times faster than text. So, if you want to get your audience’s attention, make sure you have unique visuals in the right places. High-quality images can increase the time users spend on the first page and the likelihood that they visit a second one.

·        Maximize Customer Reviews

Let customers do the talking for you with user reviews. Considering that 70 percent of customers look at product reviews before they purchase an item, testimonials can influence audience members on whether or not they follow through on buying. The best reviews are ones that build trust with the reader without sounding like they are selling a product.

·        Demonstrate Your Credibility

If your company sells to or partners with other name-brand businesses, flaunt it. People are more inclined to trust you if you can authentically associate yourself with a brand that they already know. You can also showcase any awards, certifications, or endorsements that your company has earned along the way.

Digital Engage is a digital marketing and web design company based in Tennessee. Our professional team has expertise in services like website design and development, Magento Web Design, Squarespace Design Services, BigCommerce and others. You should choose us because we provide professional consultation, value our clients, have a track record of success, and are always available to provide you with the most professional services. Call us today to learn more about our services.

Organic searches are a cornerstone to any company’s online success. Search engine optimization (SEO) can boost the quantity and quality of organic visitors to a website while establishing trust between potential consumers and the brand. Effective SEO will also help a company rank higher in search engine queries, which boosts visibility.

Consider this. Search engines, such as Google, Yahoo, and Bing, report that the number one listed website sees about 42 percent of traffic from a single search. The second result gets 11 percent while the third gets 8 percent.

Obviously, it pays to be on top. Well-executed SEO can make a world of difference to a company’s digital presence and bottom line. If you want to boost your search engine rankings, here are eight essential SEO factors to know.

Write High-Quality Content

Undoubtedly, SEO is now essential for getting top rank on search engines. The content on each website page should be relevant and useful to users. For complete optimization, a site needs to have more high-quality content than its competitors. Typically, Google rewards relatively long SEO content backed with facts and statistics and should be unique.

There are several methods to improve the content on your website, but one of the easiest ways is to write a blog. Companies can demonstrate their experience and credibility to readers with informative and entertaining posts that will have visitors coming back time and again. According to research, companies who blog receive 97 percent more links to their website than non-blogging competitors.

Update Your Content Regularly

Fresh content is king. In today’s digital ecosystem, it is not good enough to create a stunning website and leave it. Search engines reward companies that continuously prove themselves to be relevant to visitors.

Generating new content is an opportunity to share upcoming events, product launches, or changes at your company. It is also a chance to optimize specific keywords you have not used in the past. The key is to set a schedule for what and when to publish new material and to make sure it appeals to readers, not just search engines.

Maximize Links

Links come in three types: inbound, hyperlinks, and internal links. Google uses these to discover new pages and figure out how to rank each page. There is a strong correlation between the number of domains linking to a page and the page’s search engine ranking.

Inbound links are tremendously valuable because they drive traffic from other sites to yours. The inbound link signals to Google that the content on your website is relevant to users. Additionally, hyperlinks help connect you with other companies, while internal links distribute incoming search traffic.

Boost Your Page Speed

Speed, or the lack thereof, kills. People expect things immediately these days, and website uploads are no exception. An impressive 47 percent of users will leave a site if it takes longer than three seconds to load.

Slow loading speeds lead to poor user experiences, which can negatively impact page rank. Slowness may be a result of one or many factors, including among others:

• Host issues
• Too many ads

You can get an idea of how fast your website is by using Google’s PageSpeed Tool or get in touch with our team for a website evaluation.

Web Design Matters

Don’t take the physical appearance of a website for granted. Well-designed websites should be easy to use and make pertinent information highly accessible to visitors. The more enjoyable a site is to use, the more likely people will revisit it in the future and recommend it to friends.

Make sure your content is readable, so your audience understands and makes use of the information you have to offer. When possible, condense information into bulleted lists or infographics that are more digestible than paragraphs of text. Website creators can also improve the design through the strategic use of bold type and colors, subheadings, and distinctive typography.

Upgrade Your Visuals

What users see in images can be as important as what they read. That’s why 55 percent of content marketers are focusing on creating more visual-oriented content. Sleek and eye-catching visuals can streamline information to readers while increasing the likelihood that they spend more time on your site.

Visuals can come in the form of images, infographics, or videos. More importantly, they distill essential information to the reader in a compelling manner.

Get the Most Out of Mobile

Roughly half of the Internet traffic comes from a mobile device. To account for this shift in the media landscape, Google has rolled out its first mobile-first index. The indexing will utilize a mobile-friendly test for the website to see how well they perform on smartphones.

The most important part of the user mobile experience has a website that is responsive and easy to navigate. Visitors should be able to have all the same content and information on their device displayed intuitively. This mobile design often incorporates larger fonts, compressed images, and autocorrect for forms.

Digital Engage is a digital marketing and web design company based in Tennessee. Our professional team has expertise in services like website design and development, Magento Web Design, Squarespace Design Services, BigCommerce and others. You should choose us because we provide professional consultation, value our clients, have a track record of success, and are always available to provide you with the most professional services. Call us today to learn more about our services.

Facebook is a powerful platform for small businesses and brands to connect with customers. With more than two billion users, you can reach target audiences like never before. The key is to create a compelling ad campaign that entices potential customers.

One of the most significant measurements of an ad’s success is the conversion rate. A robust conversion rate drives customers to action, whether it is subscribing to a newsletter or purchasing a product or service. Here are seven tips to boost your conversions with highly clickable Facebook Ads.

Use Eye-Catching Images

The saying a picture is worth a thousand words may be a cliché, but there is evidence to back up this notion. That’s because the human brain processes visuals 60,000 times faster than it does text. Put another way, make sure your images are eye-catching.

When deciding what images to select for the ad, you want to find something that is visually interesting and compelling. The goal is to stand out from the rest of the page while conveying your brand message and style succinctly.

Offer an Incentive

Incentives are a great way to grab people’s attention. Consumers are 57 percent more likely to buy from a brand they have never heard of if they have a coupon. Coupons, discounts, and other incentives alleviate the pressure of purchase in the case that it does not work out.

To quote Don Corleone, make them an offer that they can’t refuse. Stronger offers mean more click-throughs. Also, make sure the deal is in line with your business or organization, and always follow through on promises.

Have a Strong Call to Action

A call to action distills your business, product, or service down to its essence. It invites viewers to engage with the ad and “act” on it. A successful call to action will generate consistent click-throughs and ultimately boost your bottom line.

There is an infinite number of potential ways to write a call to action. Some of the most common options include phrasing such as:

• “Read more”
• “Learn more”
• “Try it now”
• “Call now”

Regardless of what phrase you use, make the placement easily visible, and the design distinctive.

Keep Copy Punchy

The language, tone, and diction in ads say a lot about a company. The copy will convey to target audiences what your brand stands for and the value it creates. Make sure to stand out from the competition with engaging writing that grabs hold of people’s attention.

One outstanding example of punchy copy is Dollar Shave Club. The text in their ads is casual, yet fun, which makes their content apply to a broad audience. The lack of formality or technical jargon makes their copy more accessible, so readers are inclined to want to read more.

A/B Test Everything

A/B testing is a process where two different versions of something are tested against each other to determine which performs better. Using multiple variations of an ad will help you decide what keywords, images, and incentives work and which don’t. This information is vital when it comes to informing further Facebook ad creation.

Constant A/B testing is the best way to hone in on your target audience through ads. After an ample sample of tests, ad creators should have a vivid sense of their client’s desires, demographics, and reasons for purchasing the product or service. A/B testing can also reduce bounce rates and increase content engagement.

Select the Right Ad Format

Facebook offers several different formats of ads, which have various strengths and weaknesses depending on the campaign. An example of this is Adidas’ use of Facebook’s collection feature to showcase their latest hoodie. The result was a 43 percent decrease in cost-per-conversion.

Collections and carousels are a powerful tool for businesses with multiple features or products they want to display. Facebook Offer allows for exclusive deals and discounts, including a reminder to readers to redeem the discount. There is also Facebook Canvas, which is best suited

Hone Targeting with Audience Insights

Understanding your audience is probably the most important component of highly clickable Facebook ads. One way to reveal your audience’s interests is through Audience Insights. This tool allows you to use demographics, gender, geography, and more information to pinpoint target consumers.

Digital Engage is a digital marketing and web design company based in Tennessee. Our professional team has expertise in services like website design and development, Magento Web Design, Squarespace Design Services, BigCommerce and others. You should choose us because we provide professional consultation, value our clients, have a track record of success, and are always available to provide you with the most professional services. Call us today to learn more about our services.

Pay-per-click (PPC) marketing is a model of advertising where advertisers pay a fee each time someone clicks their ad. This method ensures you only pay for confirmed visits to your site rather than just views. The low-risk nature of PPC has made it one of the most popular forms of search engine advertising.

Currently, Google and Facebook are two of the largest advertisers on the web. Google commands 37.2 percent of the digital advertising market, while Facebook holds 19.6 percent. You have likely seen countless examples of both advertisers in the form of Google Ads and Facebook Ads.

A good deal of time, effort, and research go into running an effective PPC campaign. You need to consider the target audience, demographics, keywords, and more. When executed correctly, the payoff can be enormous.

For instance, if you pay $1 for every click, and a click can net a $200 sale, you’re very likely to make a healthy profit. Furthermore, search engines, like Google, Yahoo, and Bing, will reward advertisers if their content is compelling and engaging. When users find your ads useful, Google will charge you less per click, which can boost sales even more.

If your PPC campaign doesn’t yield the results you want, we are here to help. A single tweak might be all it takes to make your ads successful. So, without further ado, here are five optimization tips to improve your PPC campaigns.

Improve the Quality of Your Ads

As mentioned previously, Google rewards relevant and exciting ads. That rewards process is a result of their quality score, which measures the click-through rate as well as the relevance of the ad and landing page. The more relevant these three components are, the better the user’s search experience will be.

There are ways to improve in each of these three areas. To improve the click-through rate, use A/B testing to determine strong keywords and write stronger ad text. Ad relevance can be improved if you make sure the keywords and ads are correlated and up to date. Finally, landing page relevance can be strengthened with attention-grabbing headlines, high-quality images or videos, and quick loading times.

Ensure the Ad Words Are Relevant to the Search Terms

While this may seem obvious, a strong correlation between the words in the ad and the search terms is essential. When certain ads underperform, it is critical to understand why. More often than not, it is because of a disparity between these two terms.

When you examine your Ad Group, look at what search terms initiated the click-through. If there is little connection between the two, update the keywords and search terms. Doing this will also improve your quality score and rate of conversion.

Enhance Your Landing Page

The old saying is that you never get a second chance to make a first impression. The same goes for your PPC landing page. When visitors click through to your website, you want to make sure they engage with what you can offer them.

Having a clean and well-designed website goes without saying, but there are several other ways to improve your landing page’s bounce. Some potential improvements, among others, include:

• Improving readability
• Adding a clear, compelling call to action
• Including video or high-quality images—or both
• Showcase customer reviews or rewards

Get the Most Out of Ad Extensions

Ad extensions are an ad format that allows users to learn more about a business, product, or service. This additional information can inform or persuade potential customers to click while increasing an ad’s overall visibility. The two primary types of ad extensions are manual and automatic.

A manual ad extension is a personalized add on that allows quick access to product information, typically under the heading or description. The most common manual type is a site link, while other extensions include location, call, app, and review. An automatic ad extension creates the information in the add-on for you based on information in customer reviews and ratings.

Utilize Negative Keywords

Figure out what keywords not to use is as important as determining the ones to use. Using negative keywords ensures your ads do not appear on irrelevant search queries. This method also allows you to boost the quality score and reduce the cost per click for each ad.

The best way to find negative keywords is to see what search terms lead to your ad. Here, you can target what are the most and less useful phrases or words when it comes to click-throughs. That way, when people use the negative keywords in queries, your ads will not appear.

Digital Engage is a full-service marketing agency, get in touch with us today!